Landlady: Travelling Sailsman

There is a heatwave in Brighton and, of course I am in Turkey, where heatwave conditions are the norm at this time of year. Contrary to popular opinion, Turkey definitely feels safer than the UK at the moment, and whatever your opinion of Erdogan, the president so loathed and loved that he’s like Marmite in a suit, he’s certainly got more of a handle on terrorism than we seem to have in the UK.

His anti terrorist measures have even gone so far as to affect me and my erratic Turkish holiday lets. An old man who lives in the village and also lets his house, joyfully informed me that you now have to pay ‘thousands’ to register the fact that you let your house and, when you do let it, must inform the government who is living therein on a daily basis. Further investigations revealed that the reason for this new clampdown is because someone from ISIS did an Airbnb rental in Istanbul recently.

I am supposed to be here in Turkey on a relaxing solo holiday, let alone having to think about ISIS members enjoying my new solar powered fairy lights.

Anti-terrorist measures have even gone so far as to affect me and my erratic Turkish holiday lets

Two days before I left, a Brighton friend who’s having terrible trouble with an unwieldy kitchen renovation decided to join me, making it no more a relaxing solo holiday. Then, a family member had some terrible news and decided to come and join me as well, making it not really a holiday at all any more. So far, I’ve spent an awful lot of time going backwards and forwards on the Bodrum ferry in order to meet distressed people, and the rest of my time in various gin and tonic counselling sessions. On top of all this, The Cuban Boyfriend has been in regular contact to ‘remind’ me that I am supposed to be finding a guy to build us a BBQ in the front yard. All the materials – a pile of big stones basically – have been sitting in the yard for over a month. Oh well, at least I’ll have something to throw at any potential Airbnb terrorists.